


I'd Give All I Have, Honey

by take_liberties



Category: Parenthood (2010)
Genre: Gen, Misses Clause Challenge, Mother-Daughter Relationship, Songfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-20
Updated: 2012-12-20
Packaged: 2017-11-21 19:34:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/601320
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/take_liberties/pseuds/take_liberties
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Nora grows up</p>
            </blockquote>





	I'd Give All I Have, Honey

**Author's Note:**

  * For [myrifique](https://archiveofourown.org/users/myrifique/gifts).



> Thank you so much for requesting this fandom. I loved Kristina before, but writing this really made me fall head-over-heels for her! Since I'm worried about how the rest of the season is going to go, I took this opportunity to make sure Nora gets a future with her mom.
> 
> Fic is inspired by the Taylor Swift song [Never Grow Up](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x1YGmOit8G0), but knowledge of the song/willingness to listen to Taylor Swift is absolutely not necessary to understand the fic!
> 
> Thanks to my betas for the support, tea, threatening e-mails, Yuletide hashtags, and for actually getting sucked into the show, thereby fulfilling the final optional detail.

It only takes Kristina and Adam three hours with all the flat-packed pieces, the allen wrench, and the wordless line-drawn instructions to put together Nora’s first big-girl bed. That’s three hours including Guacamole’s great escape and the brief period of time during which Max is so frantically convinced that there has been a tragic squishing that they have to disassemble most of it until he can be calmed down. Three hours including the revelation that Nora prefers the trundle to the bed itself and the ensuing discussion about the pros and cons of assembling the rest of it. Ultimately they do continue, and by bedtime that night there’s a fully assembled (although possibly missing up to six screws they couldn’t find a place for) twin bed with trundle and built-in nightstand where the crib had stood that morning.  
  
The first night in the bed goes pretty smoothly. Nora’s a little reluctant to climb up at first, but Kristina inches the trundle out to help bridge the gap and she knees her way up, one hand reached towards her mother in case she needs to steady herself and the other clutching the picture book she wants them to read together.

They snuggle up together; Nora rests her head against her mom as they read the story, pointing out their favorite illustrations.  
  
“Snug as a bug in a rug?” Kristina asks, tucking Nora in after finishing the story. Nora hesitates and Kristina senses discomfort and worries about the bed, that it might have been too soon, or too big, or -- “what’s wrong, baby?”  
  
“Bunny,” Nora says sternly. Kristina breathes relief and casts a glance around the room finding Bunny underneath a pile of building blocks.  
  
“Here, Bunny.” She gracelessly reaches over to pry out the stuffed rabbit with her fingertips, letting Nora keep her grip on the other hand. She hands it to Nora who pulls it into her chest, snuggling her face in between the rabbit’s ears and closing her eyes. Kristina smoothes the comforter over Nora’s shoulders, “snug now?”  
  
“Mmm,” Nora breathes out, a sleepy, barely audible sound of confirmation. Kristina smiles and flips on the nightlight.  
  
“Goodnight, kiddo.”  
  
  
***  
  
“More wine. More, keep going,” Kristina instructs as Sarah tips the bottle over the edge of her glass. There are already two empty bottles on the end table and Kristina’s putting the third in imminent peril. “There is not enough wine in the _world_.”  
  
“Okay, so Nora wanted to walk to the movies, what’s the big deal?” Sarah prompts, setting the bottle down.  
  
“No, it’s not that she wanted to walk - she asked me specifically to go around the corner and leave her there. Just, like, just out of sight of the theater, and-”  
  
“You know teenagers,” Jasmine interjects. “They’re always embarrassed by their parents. She doesn’t want to be seen-”  
  
“In that giant minivan of yours, probably, is the problem,” Sarah interrupts.  
  
“I just feel like she’s hiding something from me. She’s definitely hiding something. You went through this with Sydney, right?” Kristina turns to Julia, “how did you handle it?”  
  
“Hold up. Wait, Kristina. Haven’t you gone through this already? Haddie was a teenager-”  
  
“Yeah, that was, like, a million, billion years ago. I can’t- I don’t even remember how- Plus, Nora’s so different, she’s not like Haddie was. You know she’s got all this-” Kristina gesticulates haphazardly, and Julia laughs suddenly.  
  
“Oh my god. Kristina!” Julia puts on her best faux-offended face. “Are you asking me because you don’t know how to deal with a bad kid and you think mine are-”  
  
“Complete terrors?” Sarah supplements.  
  
“Okay, I wouldn’t say _terrors_ -” Julia protests.  
  
“Well, I mean,” Kristina cuts in, looking around at her sisters-in-law, “if I’m being totally honest... Amber was also a lot of trouble, so-” she trails off into the sound of Julia and Sarah’s laughter, sipping innocently at the full glass while Jasmine raises her hands up victoriously.

  
***  
  
“I just kinda wish one of my kids had decided not to move all the way across the country for college.” Kristina says, dropping the last of the boxes filled with Nora’s things onto the bare, school-issued mattress. “What’s so great about the East coast anyway? You know they have winters here, right?” There’s a note in her voice somewhere between teasing and genuine sadness.  
  
“Yes, mom.” Nora rolls her eyes, still smiling. “Some people actually like that, you know.” She thinks about the mittens tucked somewhere in one of these boxes. She’d been so excited to buy them the year before; Mom had taken her shopping for the important stuff when she came out to visit Haddie for New Years.  
  
She wore them for the first time when she went to Times Square and watched the ball drop with her big sister and realized how much she wanted to come back. By the time they’d made their way out of the crowds and back to Haddie’s apartment it was nearly midnight in California, so they’d called mom together and told her everything about Times Square, and the place they went to dinner first, and all cool places around Columbia they’d seen. Nora didn’t notice it, but Kristina’s smile had wavered a little, just for a second, when she saw Nora’s face light up talking about the campus and the political science program and how she was so nervous waiting to hear back.  
  
Here in the same dorm she walked past with her big sister months ago, Nora doesn’t cry when they say goodbye. She doesn’t cry even though her mom’s using up almost half the box of tissues they just bought at Target and she hasn’t seen her dad this choked up since he gave a speech at Haddie’s wedding when Nora was still a little kid.   
  
She doesn’t cry later when she’s hanging a poster and scrapes her leg climbing down off the desk. She finds the first aid kid her mom put together and even though there’s no one’s hand to squeeze when the hydrogen peroxide stings she still doesn’t cry.  
  
She doesn’t cry until bedtime, when she pulls back the comforter of her little twin bed and finds the stuffed rabbit and the note her mom slipped in there secretly.  
  
 _“Nora,_  
 _There used to be a time when you couldn’t get to sleep without Bunny there with you. I know you’re grown up now, but I thought you might want her in case you get lonely on your first night. Miss you, kid._  
 _Love you,_  
 _Mom”_  
  
Nora cradles Bunny in her hands and thinks about a time when she would wrap her arms all the way around the toy and hold it tight. She clutches it to her chest, now too small to hug properly, and that’s when she cries.


End file.
